


hand in unloveable hand.

by sshyksarry



Category: The Locked Tomb Trilogy | Gideon the Ninth Series - Tamsyn Muir
Genre: Blood, Enemies to Lovers, F/F, Gore, fighting?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-07
Updated: 2020-11-07
Packaged: 2021-03-09 05:27:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 795
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27429415
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sshyksarry/pseuds/sshyksarry
Summary: In the ninth there was Harrow and there was Gideon and that was all.
Relationships: Gideon Nav/Harrowhark Nonagesimus
Comments: 3
Kudos: 32





	hand in unloveable hand.

**Author's Note:**

> i can't start shit and i can't end shit. if this is poorly paced or feels empty i'm SORRY.

_i didn't know that you were lonely_

_if you had just told me, i'd be running down the hills to be with you_

_and i'd have told you i was lonely too_

* * *

As customary, there was bone, and there was blood, and there was Harrow, dressed in black and bleeding from the mouth.“You’re late.”

Gideon looked at her. She wasn’t wearing shoes, again. “I was busy,” she said. 

“Doing what?”

Gideon smiled and shook her shoulders out. “Your mom.”

“You’re disgusting.”

“That’s not what she said.”

Harrows mouth twisted into something ugly. She raised her hand and a skeleton, fully formed came from the pile of old and greying bone beside her. The blood from her mouth fell and another came to on the left. Gideon tightened the grip she had around her sword. 

“Are you sure you aren’t just early?”

The one on the right came for her. 

Gideon, probably too fast, really, dipped to the left and swung her sword round, cutting just barely at the ridges of it’s ribcage. It stumbled, but only a little. The one on the left came next, and Harrow stepped back until she hit a pillar and Gideon had cut through both constructs. 

Behind her, Gideon heard three more form, and watched Harrow’s nose start to bleed, too. 

“You’re going to use all your energy up,” Gideon said when one came at her from behind, it’s arms long and spindly like a spider. Gideon was sure to cut those off, first. 

“Stop talking.”

The first time they’d done this, it was in the library. They’d gotten themselves all squished up in the back corner of the fictional literature section and Gideon had almost cut through an entire stack of books before Crux sent them down here. For Harrow’s benefit, never Gideon's. 

Another construct rose, this time from the pile diagonal to them. It formed quickly, sharp arms, elbows, legs and feet. Human. With no teeth. When it came for her, it was quick, and cut a fissure into her arm first, back second, calves, third. Gideon fell. Harrow rose. 

The ninth was known for its bone. It’s grit. It’s bloody teeth. And Harrow was too. When she rose above Gideon, it was on a pile of white and black bones. It was with her nose and mouth bleeding. Up high, the light hanging from the mausoleums ceiling haloed her. 

She wasn’t pretty. Harrow, Gideon thought, was never pretty. 

She felt the next construct before she saw it. It’s arms, thicker than the last, wrapped tight around her torso and dug into her. It’s knees pressed up against the back of hers and brought her up, until she could see Harrow again, coming down, not light-footed, awkward, and stupid looking, until she was in front of Gideon again. Her paint was smearing. “Your paint is smearing.”

“Shut up.”

“I’m serious.”

“Nav, you are a waste of good ninth air.”

Gideon smiled. “But a pretty good looking waste of air.”

The arms restraining her constricted and Gideon's shoulders hurt. “Have you had enough?”

“Have you, Nonagesimus?” 

Harrow’s mouth turned petulant. Gideon felt the constructs arms loosening around her shoulders and used that, spreading them out and watching the bone snap like flimsy. Harrow made a noise, and Gideon moved her head back, knocking the construct until it burst back into bone on the ground, smelling like old, burning paper. Harrow made another sound, and Gideon grabbed her wrists and pushed until she hit the centre of the construct pile behind them.

Harrows eyes were black. Her mouth was a scar. Gideon didn’t want to look at her. “Get out of my face,” she said, and her breath was cold. All of Harrow was cold. 

Gideon hated her. Gideon hated her so much. The same as she hated the same porridge she’d eaten for breakfast lunch and dinner her entire life. The same as she hated the blanket that came with her cell. The same as she hated the cell that came with her blanket. She hated her the same as she hated the library. She hated her the same as she hated the nuns. She hated her the same as she hate herself. Gideon hated her, and it hurt. 

And then Gideon kissed her, and Harrow kissed back, and _it_ hurt, too. Harrow barely moved, but Gideon felt her hand scratching at the skin of her cheek and neck. Gideon felt Harrow’s ribs at her sides and the bones of her spine, thin and like a spider; Harrow with her ten thousand eyes. Harrow with her construct, which wasn’t, actually, so different from Gideon’s. Which was human, still, which broke, still, and bled, still. 

In the ninth, there was Harrow and there was Gideon and that was all. 


End file.
